Is Selling Counterfeit Software Worse Than Bank And Identity Fraud?

from the equivalencies dept

There's a story making the rounds about a guy who's apparently going to jail for selling unauthorized copies of software on eBay, and the software industry is trumpeting what a huge victory this is over "counterfeiting," by claiming: "The Mondello case demonstrates that these pirates won't simply get a slap on the wrist when caught. They very well may end up doing serious time in federal prison." Right, but if you read the details, the conviction wasn't just for copyright infringement, but for identity fraud and mail fraud. That is, as part of his operation, he illegally obtained peoples' bank account info. That would appear to be a lot worse than copyright infringement, but the press seems to focus only on the "counterfeiting" angle, because that's the story the software industry association seems to be feeding the press. They want people to think that they'll go to jail for piracy, when that's quite unlikely.

Always about the Agenda

They are just spinning things to suit their needs and push their agenda.

If you download something for yourself, unlikely you'll even get a slap on the wrist. If you are creating many copies, and selling them, for profit, then you can get some fines, and possibly jail time, if really unlucky.

So just keep your downloading to personal use, don't sell it, and you're unlikely to even get looked at.

Gray? Not So.

How is it a moral gray zone to sell copies of software that you brought legitimately? As far as I am concerned, this isn't wrong at all.

Maybe you have a point when somebody is actively misrepresenting themselves in order to sell software. In this case, you don't.

It may be wrong accordingly to the laws, but it doesn't necessary mean it is an illegitimate economic activity. Sometime the law is itself immoral.

In this case, these software monopolists are trying to maintain their reproduction monopoly privileges at the expense of the economy and the public.

That is not to say that illegal reproduction of software is the best way to stick it to the "man". Rather, it is probably the worst way to protest these monopolies(and it also benefit these monopolists also).

A much better way is to boycott these monopolists and use alternative software(such as Firefox, GNU/Linux, Apache) that respect the public's right to ownership of software.

The title to the article is a bit off the mark. Apparently the SIIA has been using "searchware" on eBay to identify potential sellers of counterfeit software and software not licensed for resale, and then sending that info to the criminal authorities for investigation. From what I have read as of late there are about 30+ eBay sellers who after investigation have been targeted for referral to the criminal authories.

Of course, once a matter enters the criminal justice world prosecutors look for anything and everything that can possibly be leveled as charges.

Real Problem

> but the press seems to focus only on the
> "counterfeiting" angle, because that's the
> story the software industry association
> seems to be feeding the them.

The real problem here isn't the software industry. Of course they're going to spin things in their favor. That's to be expected.

The problem is the media, which no longer ever bothers to really do its job and investigate a story. They just parrot press releases from various industry and government groups without actually checking to see if they are accurate or not.

Real Problem

> but the press seems to focus only on the
> "counterfeiting" angle, because that's the
> story the software industry association
> seems to be feeding the them.

The real problem here isn't the software industry. Of course they're going to spin things in their favor. That's to be expected.

The problem is the media, which no longer ever bothers to really do its job and investigate a story. They just parrot press releases from various industry and government groups without actually checking to see if they are accurate or not.